


Five Gods Tony Stark Never Worshiped

by plingo_kat



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: ARGH, Gen, i just have lots of feelings, idek what this is, too many feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-27
Updated: 2012-06-27
Packaged: 2017-11-08 17:32:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/445712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plingo_kat/pseuds/plingo_kat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony maybe thinks it all starts when he’s four.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Gods Tony Stark Never Worshiped

**i.**  
Tony maybe thinks it all starts when he’s four. Four, when he finally makes his own circuit board instead of having to copy one of his father’s designs, when he runs up to Howard with the soldered mess and tugs on one brown trouser leg.

“Daddy!” he says. (He remembers this, remembers every word.) “Daddy, look what I made!”

“That’s great, Tony,” Howard says, and pats him on the head. He doesn’t look up from his own project. “But daddy’s busy right now, okay? Why don’t you show your mother?”

He spends the rest of his life trying to live up to an impossible ideal, until he finally just says _fuck it_ and does whatever the hell he wants. 

It takes a long, long time for him to stop believing that he needs his father’s approval. He may not know it when he’s a foot tall and precocious, but he loses the unwavering, unquestionable love of a child for a parent before he stops pronouncing ‘good’ as ‘dood.’

 **ii.**  
“Hey, Stark!”

Tony turns, red plastic cup securely in hand. “Hey, Macintosh.”

“Hanging out with the big kids now, huh?”

Tony shrugs and takes a gulp of his Jack and Coke. “If by big kids you mean people who can do multivariable calculus in their head, I’m not sure this counts.”

Macintosh grins and brings a hand up to his heart, but his eyes narrow. “Is it true that you only got in because—“

“Tony!” Rhodey throws his arm around Tony’s shoulders, beer slopping against the sides of his cup. “Where’ve you been, my man, there are some _cute_ girls I gotta introduce you to.”

Tony smiles insincerely at Macintosh. “Duty calls.”

“Man,” Rhodey mutters as they walk away. “Bag his face, seriously.”

Tony barks a laugh. “Yeah, he’s an idiot. But let’s forget about it, you said there were girls? You better pick the one you want, or else the Stark charm is going to blow them all away.”

“Get real.” Rhodey gives him a friendly shake. “Maybe when you can grow facial hair, Casanova.”

It turns out that neither of them can hook up with a girl that night. Instead they get blitzed-out drunk and stumble into the bathroom to throw up.

“Praying to the porcelain goddess,” Rhodey says, spitting. “Welcome to college.”

Just to be contrary, Tony throws up in the sink.

**iii.**  
 _”You stick to the plan!”_

He wants to pound on a wall, to scream, to _hit_ Yinsen, to hurt somebody. He feels short of breath, for once not because of the hole in his chest but because of rage, deep and dark enough to drown in, and _oh look_ there are convenient enemies to attack after all.

Every action he takes after that, after he escapes from a cave in Afghanistan and the bare barren desert, is defined by that moment. By the constricting in his chest and the buzzing in his head, by those in authority trying to tell him what to do, by a world gone mad.

By one man fooling him, and ruining (saving) everything.

He isn’t a savior, or a good man, or reformed, just as he wasn’t a hopeless drunk or completely irresponsible or the personification of everything that was wrong in America. If he’s acting for the benefit of everybody, that includes himself.

He isn’t a hero.

 **iv.**  
Tony has exactly thirty-seven triple-encrypted files set with five separate self-destruct protocols stored in his personal system.

Today, one more file is going to be added to that list.

“Humanity.”

“Sheep. I mean, not always, and sometimes in a good way! Sheep can be useful, you know? With, um, wool and stuff. God, I’m bad at this.”

“Indeed, sir. Father?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Mother?”

“Maria.”

“Sir, please don’t censor yourself. In order to make an accurate data analysis, your answers must be truly instinctive.”

“Yeah, yeah. Fine, hit me.”

“Liar.”

“Good.”

“Truth.”

“Math.”

“Love.”

“Death.”

“Cave.”

“Yinsen.”

“Self.”

“Hate.”

“God.”

“Absent.”

 **v.**  
When Loki walks up to him, he can almost predict the words that come out of his mouth – obvious, really, a god of lies using misdirection, trickery, manipulating others to do his dirty work for him – and the cold as Loki’s scepter touches his chest right above the arc reactor is nearly a physical blow. He curls himself inwards a little and breathes as the cool twines itself through his body, radiating outward like the burn of whisky hitting his stomach, and when the feeling reaches his head—

—when it reaches his eyes—

 _Infinity_. He always knew he was empty, that there was something missing – no, that’s not right, he wasn’t _missing_ anything, he carved it out and threw it away because he doesn’t _need_ it, he is _Tony Stark_ and faith and false hope are the prerogative of the self-delusional. Tony is too smart to be able to fool himself. To _want_ to fool himself.

And now, as eternity unfolds itself behind his eyes, he feels like he can know _everything_.

“Oh, little god,” he hears himself say. “Do you know what you’ve done?”

And as Loki’s eyes widen, he smiles.

**Author's Note:**

> So really, this was an excuse to write that last scene, because f;sdlkafj CAN YOU IMAGINE EVIL TESSERACT TONY BEING A TOTAL BADASS? CAN YOU? And then because I have too many Tony Fucking Stark feelings, and also because I couldn't actually think of what happened _after_ Tony went all blue-eyed and evil, I did this. I'd say I'm sorry, but I'm not actually sorry.


End file.
